Chapter 28: Is This What You Did?

The voice of a middle-aged man came calmly from the other end of the phone: "Fine. Before we arrive, no matter who knocks on the door, do not open it!"

We'll be there soon!"

He hung up after saying that.

Putting away the phone, the man, now relaxed, plopped down beside the woman, trembling all over, unable to stop.

Everything that happened today was, for them, better described as the sky collapsing and the earth splitting, completely overturning all their previous cognition and worldview.

As a result, he hadn't even had time to notice and bandage the wound on his thigh; a lot of blood had flowed, and at this moment he could no longer hold on.

It was the woman who, after the fright, finally forced herself to endure her fear, ignored the three corpses lying on the ground, propped up her body as soft as noodles, found the medicine box, took out bandages and alcohol, and bandaged the man's wound to stop the bleeding.

As illegal immigrants, unless absolutely necessary they were unwilling to go to the hospital, so they had prepared these things early on; for things like small colds and minor injuries, they solved them themselves.

To be honest, only after coming here did they know that colds on this side were very scary; the prescriptions doctors wrote for them were, for them, quite terrifying things.

Have you ever seen a bottle of two thousand painkillers, prescribed so openly and aboveboard, and then you go to the pharmacy and buy them!

Such a crazy prescription, they dare not use it, let alone afford the prescription, because they have no medical insurance.

"Jiping, do you really plan to make that thing for them?"

While using alcohol to clean her man's wound, the woman asked, and after asking she hesitated, her expression full of struggle: "Although we are materialists..."

But in fact, we came here after thousand hardships and ten thousand difficulties, and how is that not idealism! Idealistically pursuing so-called Western freedom.

Since it is idealism.

I always feel that making this thing is lacking in virtue; if there is hell in the world, people who make this thing will go to hell."

When she said this, the woman suddenly felt what she said was a bit heavy; just as she was about to apologize, the man patted her hand.

"I know my limits!"

If the woman's words just now, "people who make this thing will go to hell," had been heard in the past, he would have laughed it off.

But the strange behavior of the black man Eric with the knife, and the situation he saw on the monitor, made him take these words to heart.

"Ru Yue, we are no longer in the domestic country! If there were a choice, I would not be willing to do this kind of thing!"

"But..."

He reached out his hand, pulling the woman into his arms, hugging her a bit tightly, then repeated in a heavy tone: "We are no longer in the domestic country!"

After saying this sentence, tears flowed down in a rush! The woman put down the thing in her hand, and with complex emotions embraced her man, also silently weeping.

For the two of them, the past few decades had been smooth sailing; both were only children, studying under their parents' care, deskmates, taking the university entrance exam.

After graduating from university, both became teachers at a university and a high school respectively in the same city; life was peaceful and beautiful.

It's just that one day they suddenly became tired of this monotonous life, wanting to break free from this day-after-day, calm-as-water cage.

Basically, every post-80s and post-90s person had been immersed since childhood in the Western world created by Lin He Yizhe; back then, few people did not yearn for such a free and civilized world.

After checking many materials, they obtained a tourist visa and flew to the dreamt-of World Beacon, the civilized country America.

Not long after getting off the plane, they slipped into an alley and tore up their passports; from then on they became black households.

At first it was okay; the wages accumulated from being teachers over the years were not few, but that was not much domestically; yet after arriving in America, the prices here dealt them a heavy blow.

They were black households and needed jobs with identity, which they absolutely could not do.

Moreover, even if they were not black households, the degrees and certificates they had painstakingly obtained domestically were not recognized by America! They could not find a job for a long time, living off their savings, watching the balance in their card decrease more and more; they became anxious. Rent, utilities, property fees, food expenses—which one did not cost money? Left with no choice, they had to find a local Chinese restaurant; those elegant and peaceful people's educators domestically, upon coming here, also humbled themselves.

The woman washed dishes in the back kitchen, and the man, using his basic cooking skills, started chopping.

Because they were black households, the money they received was not much, especially in these recent years, as more and more illegal immigrants came, not few from the domestic country.

This led to more people competing for positions, involution, and their competitiveness weakened.

Like the dishwashing position in the back kitchen, the woman encountered very fierce competition.

The speed and cleanliness with which Mexicans washed dishes were simply not comparable to the previously spoiled female teacher.

This led to the couple's already meager wages being pressed down even further by the boss.

Moreover, there was something even more excessive; it was said that Chinese restaurants in New York had already started paying in RMB.

So during this period, the emotions weighing on the couple's hearts accumulated day by day; now they were like pieces of stone, piling up in the chest, stuck in the throat.

Today, encountering such a near-death scene, after helping his woman up, he finally broke down.

Saying the sentence "We are no longer in the domestic country," then the two actually embraced and wept before the three corpses, filled with regret.

After a bout of bitter crying, the man Zhou Jiping was the first to stop crying, gently stroking his wife's back: "It's okay! It's okay now! From now on there will be nothing!"

The woman raised her head while sobbing, looking at the man with tearful eyes to complain:

"Before, I always felt that the saying 'the old society turned people into ghosts, and now turns ghosts into people' did not touch me deeply!

I always thought it was in the past and had nothing to do with us now! But now our encounter...

Actually, thinking about it, we lived an enviable superior life domestically.

Every year when school let out for summer and winter vacations, we had time to travel to various places, to the seaside, to places we wanted to go.

That was a life fit for humans!

But coming to America, without identity, we could only do black labor, and face dangers countless times worse than the domestic safety environment.

You say, did our brains get water in them back then! It's not like we couldn't make it domestically, owing a buttload of debt; why be so stupid as to think of coming here illegally?

What were we thinking back then..."

The man hugged her tightly, murmuring in a low voice: "There's no going back! From the moment we came out, after posting those self-righteous things online, we can't go back!

So, now we must first survive!

The Fuzhou Gang is our last retreat; if we don't take this path of retreat, these gangs in the Black Community won't let us go!

Survive first..."

Suddenly someone knocked on the door, and a familiar low voice of Hu Qing came: "Jiping, we're here, open the door!"

The man hurriedly got up, limping as he ran to open the door; the moment he opened it, he saw outside a middle-aged man with a cold expression, accompanied by several black-clad younger brothers.

"Brother Rusong, thank you for your trouble!"

The middle-aged man before him, sporting a crew cut and a cold expression, was named Zhang Rusong, a Big Brother of the Los Angeles Fuzhou Gang, and a fellow townsman of the man Zhou Jiping.

Zhang Rusong stepped into the house, saw the three corpses on the floor and the various traces on the ground, and his eyes narrowed: "Did you do this?"

(Chapter End)